Department of Archaeology

Abstract

The article traces the origins, institutional development, and academic evolution of the Department of Archaeology at Sofia University “St Kliment Ohridski” from its establishment in the early 1890s to the late twentieth century. It reconstructs the history of archaeological teaching in Bulgaria through the work of Vaclav Dobrusky, Bogdan Filov, Dimitar P. Dimitrov, and Atanas Milchev, who laid the foundations of modern Bulgarian archaeology.

The first lectures in archaeology began in the 1890/1891 academic year under the Czech scholar Vaclav Dobrusky, whose efforts linked university education with the work of the National Museum. In 1920, Bogdan Filov was appointed full professor and head of the newly founded Department of Archaeology and History of Art, establishing a research seminar, a specialised library, and a teaching museum that defined the department’s academic structure.

In the following decades, Dimitar P. Dimitrov (later an academician) expanded research into Thracian culture, ancient art, and Roman provincial monuments. During the 1950s and 1960s, Atanas Milchev initiated new directions in medieval and Slavic archaeology and institutionalised field training for students.

The article also examines the generational renewal of the department, the creation of postgraduate programmes, and its broad international collaborations with universities in Berlin, Moscow, Budapest, Szeged, and Saarbrücken.

Lyudmil Getov concludes that the Department of Archaeology, with more than a century of tradition, functions as both a centre of higher education and a leading research institution contributing to the preservation and study of Bulgaria’s cultural heritage.